To summit Mount Everest requires incredible tenacity, fitness and a willingness to negotiate the risk of death. For Lhakpa Sherpa, who has climbed the world’s tallest peak more than any other woman, it has required even more: overcoming poverty, defying her family and Nepali culture that did not support her ambition and surviving an abusive marriage to a fellow mountaineer who nearly killed her. Related Stories Documentary Rob Reiner, Ron Howard, Fisher Stevens, Morgan Neville, Andrew Jarecki Among Big Names Squaring Off In Emmy Documentary Categories Acquisitions Netflix Lands Lucy Walker Doc ‘Mountain Queen: The Summits Of Lhakpa Sherpa’ – TIFF Sherpa’s extraordinary story, and her attempt to break her own record for summiting Everest, is told in the Oscar-contending documentary Mountain Queen: The Summits of Lhakpa Sherpa , which debuts in theaters this week before its July 31 premiere on Netflix .
Director Lucy Walker , a two-time Academy Award nominee, joins the latest edition of Deadline’s Doc Talk podcast to discuss her film and the remarkable woman at its heart. Walker ( Waste Land , The Tsunami and the Cherry Blossom , Blindsight ) explains why it was “terrifying” to make her film and why the relationship between Lhakpa and her daughters Sunny and Shiny became such a key part of Mountain Queen . She also tells us why the prospect of ferocious Yetis lurking on Everest almost kept Sherpa from hiking up the mountain.
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